Recent Progress and Future Perspectives of Carbon Dots in the Detection, Degradation, and Enhancement of Drugs

Abstract Carbon dots (CDs) are new types of nanoparticles with sizes less than 10 nm in diameter. CDs with their unique properties can detect, degrade, and surprisingly enhance drugs. This review focuses on three major aspects of CD‐drug interactions: detection, degradation, and enhancement of drugs using CDs. The review begins with a brief account of the significant development milestones, the synthetic approaches adopted, and modification methods. The detection section of the review moves on to a classified presentation of modified and unmodified CDs in drug detection, as well as an examination of the tactics and background hypotheses required to confirm the mechanism. Following that, specific attention is paid to the structural and optical features of CD/photocatalytic systems, as well as a summary of CD's role in photocatalytic degradation. A thorough examination of the changes in photocatalyst properties when they are composited with CDs, is also carried out, as well as the characterization techniques used to confirm the presence of CDs. Even though the enhancement section is still in its infancy, special attention is paid to pique readers’ interest in further research in that field. Finally, new paths are proposed based on the gaps, challenges, and future perspectives.